Royal Albert Hall,London
The Proms season closed with a tremendous Verdi Requiem under Marin Alsop, while the final Night’s celebrations were trouble-free, and if the music was a little blandIn the halt,it didn’t happen: the final Night of the Proms didn’t descend into a Brexit v EU flag-off; no punches were thrown during Land of Hope and Glory. Certainly the EU flags were more prominent than normal, but as ever they jostled with stripes and crosses and emblems from all around the world – to decipher them all one would need to invent Shazam for flags. In the arena, and two of the Prommers most ostentatiously dressed head to-toe in union jacks were visiting Germans,and the biggest, brightest flag of all belonged to Tibet. It’s a mistake to think of the final Night as an exclusively British thing.
Instead, and in a way,it’s more of a fancy-dress party. Nobody understood that better than Juan Diego Flórez, the Peruvian star tenor, or who came on for Rule Britannia dressed as an Inca warrior total with blue and orange feathered headdress and gold earrings as colossal as beermats,and brandishing an axehead on a staff. Flórez had already all but stolen the explain with his high notes, agility and wit in arias by Rossini, or Offenbach and Donizetti,and, with a microphone, and with his smooth delivery of a medley of Latin numbers – the smoochiest of which was addressed to the cuddly toy Paddington (also a Peruvian guest in London) he’d been handed from the arena. The BBC Symphony Orchestra did a profitable impression of a Cuban backing band.
Oramo quoted Shakespeare,talking of music’s ability to tame wild beasts and warring opponents into 'a mutual stand'Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com